Course project
My project in Dynamic Figure Drawing course
by Petit Philippe @philippe_petit_arts
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Hi everyone,
With the agreement of Shane Wolf, I will use the videos of the 4 hours drawing demo to make this final project. To do so, I display the Shane’s video on a TV at 2 meters away of my easel as if I had the dynamic model in front of me, and I will draw « live », it’s not a copy of a static photo.
I chosed an A2 Canson white fine grain paper.
I’ll show different steps of the project if it can help somebody else.
3 comments
shane_wolf
Teacher PlusHello Philippe,
First of all thank you so very much for having taken and completed my course! I hope you learned a lot of good information that you can continue to apply to your own work.
Your setup looks good; setting up the screen 2 meters from your easel was a good way to mimic having the model. I can also tell that you did indeed do an original drawing from the model as opposed to simply copying my drawing. Good job!
Overall her gesture and proportions look good. Just a few small tweaks would make it even more solid: her arms need to be a little thicker (not the deltoids, just the biceps down to the bend of the elbows), and she could be just a little thinner at the waist on her left side (you had it better in your very first step where you cut in to her external oblique on the left; as the drawing lived on you lost that small but important articulation).
In terms of values, her darkest darks should also have included most of her hair. Really lay into your 2B for her hair, just as you did for the dark shadow on her inner thigh. Getting her hair nice and dark will bring you more contrast (and thus more light) to her upper back.
The shadow value that you used on her right side (scapula, spinal erectors, right buttock) is good, and this gives her good form on her right side. However, that same value should also have been used for all of the shadows on her left side. If you hold your hand up to your drawing such that you block off her left side and only see her right side, the drawing has good forms. But when you switch to blocking off her right side and only looking at the left side of the drawing, the forms are not as strong. This is because the shadows are not dark enough.
The shadow shapes themselves are well drawn (from looking at your step 2). Let's take her butt as an example: her right cheek turns nicely, but the left cheek is relatively flat. Darken those shadow shapes on her left cheek to the same value as those on her right, and the whole butt will have strong form. The same will be true on her back with regard to that nice, big shadow shape on her left side.
Also, remember the "light-shadow barrier" you drew in your 4th value scale. Currently on your drawing the reflected lights on her left side break this barrier and join the same value range as some of your lights. When you darken these shadows you can of course maintain the reflected lights, just at a much darker value. Squinting your eyes will help you see the "bigger" more "simplified" division of light and shadow of the model, even on your TV screen.
You can anticipate that in darkening some of you shadows, this will of course have an impact on some of your lights, too, because you will be changing the value context. Begin with the shadow advice above, then re-evaluate the neighboring lights. Very often these modifications seem arduous, but are in fact quite quick and efficient IF you know where to attack! And the impact on the drawing is immediately visible.
Your contour looks good, nice and attentive to her anatomy. Just one last recommendation concerning her hair: typically the hair edges are amongst the softest (if not THE softest) edges in our work. When we draw hair with hard edges, it gives either a wet or greasy effect (which is completely ok if that's the look you want). When hair is in its natural state, it's a mixture of very soft "fly away" bits, more compact and tight bits, and everything in between, all of it being softer than any of the figure's edges itself. In general, so long as the hair edges are treated differently than the edges of the figure, you are telling the viewer that there are 2 different substances at play: hair versus skin. This principle would apply to any hair on the body: pubic, armpit, chest, bearding, mustache, even as small scale as eyebrows and eyelashes!
I hope this information helps you out not only on this drawing but also for your own, personal work as well.
Congratulations on finishing the course!!
philippe_petit_arts
@shane_wolf WoW, this is a real review !!
Thank you so very much for all these so valuable analysis, comments and advices !!
First review so extensive and precise I ever got ! This is really precious. Thank you for all your time and commitment in this course.
I just need a last advice, I’ve noticed your remark on the darks on her left side and her hair, I was aware of this but when trying to darken these areas my 2B didn’t let much of graphite, I think the paper was too saturated or there were incompatibility with HB or 2H underneath. Is it that possible ? Do I have to go straight to dark in first instance to avoid this situation ?
shane_wolf
Teacher PlusHello Philippe,
I'm glad you enjoyed my review! That's what I'm here for, right?! : ) I hope there was some useful info in there.
To answer your question about the hair, if you had used either your HB or your 2H (or both) before trying your 2B, then yes this was the problem. Remember in the materials lesson I explained that with graphite one must always begin with the softer graphites first, then layer the harder ones on top (if you're doing a layered drawing). The soft 2B just simply cannot adhere to the harder graphites, so this could indeed be what happened in your drawing.
In your step 1 and 2 photos, all of that should have been just the 2B pencil. Then when you filled in your shadow shapes, that still was just the 2B. It doesn't have to be super dark at first, but it does need to be the 2B. Then, as your drawing develops and you realize the hair needs to go darker, you just keep layering on your 2B with more and more pressure until you have the correct value. If you still want to fine tune the hair, you can then start using your HB on top of the 2B for smaller details.
I hope that helps!!
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